


Stained with the Dead

by SunStoneSpark



Category: Booster Gold (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, can be read as booster/ted if you want but works fine as a friendship here, ted is understandably very worried about everything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-17 12:36:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16095806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunStoneSpark/pseuds/SunStoneSpark
Summary: Following Booster’s ill-advised attempts to give Batman and Catwoman a wedding present, Booster finds himself struggling to cope with what happened.





	Stained with the Dead

**Author's Note:**

> Written all the way back in May as an immediate response to King's introduction of Booster into Rebirth Batman (Major plot details from that arc mentioned, #45 to #47). It didn't form the way I wanted it to, so I held off publishing for months, even though it's just a very short thing I needed to get off my mind at the time.

Booster Gold stood on the balcony, leaning forward onto the railing. He held his goggles in his hands, somewhat outstretched. If he dropped them, they'd be gone forever, lost to the distant lights below, an array of glittering golds and oranges in the dusk, the traffic so far away that the sounds were muffled in the wind. 

He tilted them to one side slightly, holding a hinge in each hand and inspected the way the light shimmered off them, glimmering a soft topaz. He found himself standing there, staring at them for far too long, interrupted from his trance-like reverie by the mention of his name. 

"Michael?" 

It was Ted, he'd know that voice anywhere. Even without turning to look, he recognised the sleep-worn timbre, and the tiny, tiny hint of something else. Booster didn't know how to put it, but it hurt every time he heard it. That little hint of something upsetting the other man, that tone that slipped through when he was tired and concerned and upset. 

"You've been staring at those goggles all night." 

Booster tilted them again, just by a fraction this time. Ted watched the motion in the corner of his eye. Silence settled in again. Ted leant against the railing, propping himself up on one arm, body turned towards his friend. Booster didn't move. 

"There's something on them," Booster commented after far too long had passed. He rubbed absent-mindedly at the spot with his thumb, a well-practised motion, and exhaled. It had gotten cold. The breath had released a small of smoke in the chilled air. He moved his thumb away and angled the goggles at Ted. "Can you see it?" 

Ted barely glanced at the goggles before returning his gaze to Booster. He didn't look at them long enough, Booster thought. You can't notice a stain if you don't look at it. 

Ted sighed, looked like he was going to speak, sighed again, and then finally spoke. 

"What happened?" 

Booster frowned, eyes drifting off to some distant point. 

"I... I saw something bad." 

Ted stayed quiet, giving him room to speak. 

"I did something I maybe shouldn't have." 

Upon glancing over and seeing the concern in Ted's eyes he immediately attempted to lessen the impact of the remark. 

"But it's fine now! I saved the the world! It's done. Sorted. Told Bruce. Selina." Inhaling, he closed his eyes and stretched out, leaning back onto the railing in a similar position to how he'd been standing before. "Gone now." 

"What did you do?" Ted's voice was soft but urging, a panic beginning to gnaw away at him, to chew at the fringes of his mind. He was hardly suited to playing the role of psychiatrist, since he'd been through enough of his own problems, but he found himself cast in the part anyway. 

"Wedding present." He folded the hinges of the goggles inward, and clasping them in one hand, held them outwards, dangling perilously over the busy city streets below. He wondered if they'd shatter. How big the pieces would be. If he'd still be able to see that damn stain smearing their remains, a spatter upon a freshly inanimate corpse. It made him feel sick. 

"Thought I could save Bruce's parents. Great present. Why wouldn't it be? Skeets said a cheese tray would be better. Nah. Not good enough, Bats has everything, I said. _Bats definitely has a cheese tray._ " 

Booster tightened his grip round the goggles. He probably couldn't crush them like that, but if he could, would he? He didn't know. Didn't even know if he liked the thought of it, the material cracking in his fists. Maybe he would. He hadn't tried. He wouldn't know unless he tried. 

"But everything went  _wrong_. Really  _wrong_. Like, Dick-Grayson-with-a-gun  _wrong_. Bruce and Selina weren't together and that was bad because wedding present. For their wedding." 

He squeezed his fists round the goggles. There was no bend, no movement, nothing. Just the suspicion that they'd be fine until they weren't. That they'd be whole until they splintered into his palms. 

"It was going to be okay though because I'd bring them back together, and they'd  _love_  each other, y'know? Because they already  _loved_ each other, but,  _somewhere else_. And Batman had already fixed things with _love_  because of that one timed Ivy remembered she loved Harley and it fixed everything and the world was saved. And then if anything ever, happens to me, then I know Batman will find you, because he's smart like that and he knows that _I love you so much_  that it could definitely fix anything _except_  when I was  _there_  you... you weren't...! " 

Booster trailed off, refusing to follow that thought and noticed he was clutching the goggles tighter than before, breathing faster than he should've been. Ted placed a hand on Booster's, who was shaking slightly, barely noticeable but there regardless. 

Slowly, Booster calmed, short shallow breathes turning into deeper, steadier ones. Clouds rolled out overhead, over a sky murky with light pollution, yet still clear enough to make out the distant shapes of stars, struggling to shine. Steadily, the sturdy grip Booster had over his goggles began to loosen. Ted kept his hand on Booster's. That felt right. 

"I saw Bruce die. Not our Bruce. The other one, from there.  _Because of what'd I'd done_. He  _hates_  me." 

The golden-haired man instinctively traced the area of the stain with his thumb again. 

"Right here. His blood. It won't come off." 

Ted felt the other man stiffen, gaze fixed upon the spot of the non-existent stain. 

“It won’t go.” 

He remained still, staring blankly. Beneath them, the city went on as usual, the distant sound of vehicles speeding through golden rays of light. It was a little windier than normal, from the north, Ted realised, not that it mattered.  

"You should see somebody." There was that tone again, the tone that hurt Booster so much. Pain and hurt and worry and so much more all rolled into one horrible, upsetting bundle. 

"I can get the stain out on my own, _just not yet_ , I don't need to  _see somebody_ _to help me clean it_." 

"I meant a  _doctor_. A  _psychiatrist_ , whatever, buddy. Just  _something_.  _Somebody_." The panic had come through, an urgency bubbling up. It happened more since Ted retired from crimefighting. They both knew it came from a sense of helplessness but neither said a word. What point was there? 

"I'm fine. I'll be able to get the stain out. Then it'll be okay." He intertwined his fingers with Ted's. "I'll be okay." 

"You went through a lot, Mikey." The panic was supressed, buried yet again. It threatened to erupt back up and he struggled to drown it. "You saw a friend die. That's not easy for anyone, even exceptionally handsome time travelling rogues." 

Booster laughed. It was short, but that was okay. Ted had needed to see Booster laugh again. It felt like too long. The lull the silence after left was more comfortable this time. Less anticipation, less pressure. It made Ted's suggestion a lot easier. 

"We could go together, if you want?" Ted wasn't sure that he'd be allowed to sit in on a session like that but he'd do what he could and if Booster wanted him there, then he'd find a way. 

Booster looked away, expression unreadable from Ted's angle, yet delicately lit by the mild glow below. It highlighted the contours of his face, allowed Ted to see how worn down he looked. How defeated and tired and miserable he seemed. Ted squeezed his hand round Booster's, and the latter sighed, releasing a breath he never knew he had been holding. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly, and bit down on his bottom lip, nearly drawing blood. Booster looked like he was on the verge of crying, expression contorted in a desperate attempt to stop it from happening.  

Ted hugged Booster. He didn't want to see him cry, he never did, but the second he had reached out, Booster had latched onto him, grasping and sobbing and desperate. The goggles clattered to the floor, abandoned. One solid piece of clear golden material. Not a mark. Ted held Booster tighter. Things could get better. They had to.


End file.
